


Anything That Touches

by antheiasilva



Series: Canon Compliant One Shots [2]
Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Prequel Trilogy, Star Wars: The Clone Wars (2008) - All Media Types
Genre: Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, Chronic Pain, Clone Wars, Exhaustion, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Loneliness, Obi-Wan Kenobi Gets a Hug, Obi-Wan Kenobi Needs a Hug, Obi-Wan Kenobi is a Mess, let him sleep
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-12
Updated: 2020-10-12
Packaged: 2021-03-08 00:00:12
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,601
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26962543
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/antheiasilva/pseuds/antheiasilva
Summary: After a brutal battle on Alderaan, Obi-Wan Kenobi stands in the rain.Alone. Or so he thinks.
Relationships: Qui-Gon Jinn & Obi-Wan Kenobi
Series: Canon Compliant One Shots [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1555864
Comments: 11
Kudos: 132
Collections: Backwards QuiObi Bang





	Anything That Touches

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Lilibet](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lilibet/gifts).
  * Inspired by [a little fall of rain](https://archiveofourown.org/works/26866576) by [LittleLynn](https://archiveofourown.org/users/LittleLynn/pseuds/LittleLynn). 



> This is a late entry for the Reverse Big Bang hosted by the brilliant, talented and wondrous Qui-Gon/Obi-Wan Discord Server.
> 
> I will be posting the art by the unbelievable Lilibet sometime soon, but for now you can check it out over at LittleLynn's A Little Fall of Rain, written for the same piece (linked above).
> 
> Endless thanks to Lilibet for the stunning and evocative art! It was truly a delight to imagine my way in.
> 
> And much deep appreciation of treescape for her lovely and insightful beta comments.
> 
> And many thanks to tessiete for hosting the challenge and her ongoing patience!
> 
> Finally, I want to extend boundless affection for the server that has been brightening my days since I made it for the 20th anniversary last year. Thanks for being the absolute best, friends!

_When one is alone and lonely, the body  
gladly lingers in the wind or the rain,  
or splashes into the cold river, or  
pushes through the ice-crusted snow. _

_Anything that touches._

—Mary Oliver, “Leaves and Blossoms Along the Way”

***

He stands sentry outside the perimeter of the battle camp. He is not on duty anymore. He has a few precious hours for sleep and food… or at least rest and a ration bar. He doubts sleep would come, and it will be a long time before he counts rations as _food_. 

Behind him, Alderaan’s mountains tower, black shapes against a purple sky. His eyes follow the grey-white line of the distant horizon, seeking the light out of their own volition, or out of habit. He can hardly tell the difference any more.

What he sees is something else entirely.

_Droids and clones in battered armour moving so fast that he has to use the Force to slow his internal perception of time and stretch out that one second glimpse of the future that the Force gives him. He doesn’t know how non-force sensitives cope with the speed and chaos. He hopes he never will. The blaster fire is even faster, invisible until it finds its mark. His vision whited out with foul smoke. Sparks. The blur of his own lightsaber, his muscles honed to react. Everything happening around him, as if through a force field. It does not touch him._

_He just keeps moving, surrendered to instinct and the Force._

Even now, still as he is, he feels as if he’s still moving. Memory plays in his mind’s eye or on the backs of his eyelids, like an inescapable holofilm. He can still hear the screams and screeching of metal, Grievous's hacking cough behind him. He can still smell the acrid smell of burnt wires and scorched armor. His muscles pulse and tendons pull tight to keep him from hurtling forward into a scene that no longer lies before him.

His mind feels like it’s going everywhere at once. His rigidity is an attempt to still himself. From the outside it looks effective, but his jaw aches from clenching and a yawn is forming in his mouth. He is tired; he must be, despite the stims and the adrenaline. But he is afraid if he stops, he will collapse, crushed beneath the weight of exhaustion of nearly a thousand days of war. 

He knows what Qui-Gon would say now. He would tell him to come to the present moment through the Living Force. 

“But Master, the problem with living in the present moment is that it is connected to other moments,” he quips aloud in rebuttal. It’s an argument he used when he was a young padawan, with much the same, if not more polished, sass that used to make his master chuckle before he composed a response or worse, an exercise, that showed him the error of his ways. 

Now he laughs because Qui-Gon is not there to laugh, and it is a pained sound because he misses his master bitterly and wishes he was here to sidestep his witty jab and bring him back to himself. Anakin has never mastered that, though Ahsoka is on her way. She is more like Qui-Gon than she could ever imagine.

“You would be proud of them, Master,” he whispers, jaw still tight, but he can taste a little more air now and he realizes his face is wet.

It is raining. He can feel tiny pinpricks of cold where drops splash against his cheeks and brow. They catch on his beard and eyelashes, patter against his armour. Every drop is a tiny sensation for his numbed body to feel in exquisite detail. His mind opens to the small miracle of rain, condensed and formed and set free from the clouds above to seep into the earth and his skin.

The Living Force tingles and beckons with every drop, every whisper of wind, every rustle of leaves and blades of grass. Alderaan is rich with greenery, with life, and all of a sudden he can sense all of it. He can smell the soil rich with plant matter, the sweet-sharp air of the pines in front of him, and the smoke from campfires behind him. 

He tilts his face to the rain and sinks back into his body.

And it _hurts_.

He doesn’t know how long he can keep doing this. Stomach sour from caffeine and nerves and tasteless protein bars. Ache behind his eyes. Muscles strained and burning. His right knee is sore from a forgotten injury. Pins and needles plague his fingers and wrists. His jaw aches from clenching. His teeth hurt. His skin crawls with itchiness from sweat and dirt. His feet are permanently sore from standing all the time. He hasn’t felt his pinky toe on his left foot in months. The pressure on his chest and the tightness in his shoulders feel eternal.

A warmth appears at his back, like a heavy palm between his shoulder blades. In a low rumble that vibrates in his ribs, he hears an impossible voice utter his name.

“Obi-Wan.”

“Qui-Gon,” he breathes in wonder, even as panic coils like a snake in his gut.

“Breathe, Obi-Wan,” his master’s voice whispers from behind him, soft, like a mother or a lover, as if he could feel the tickle of whiskers on his cheek and breath on his ear.

The heated pressure on his back expands and encircles him.

"Give it to me, Obi-Wan. Every ache, every pinch, every hurt. And I will give them to the Force.”

It cannot be. It cannot be. And yet he does not shrink away. Does he believe against all rational possibility that Qui-Gon is here with him? He cannot say, but he does know he does not have the strength to resist such gentleness.

“And my sorrow?” he pleads. “My anguish? My exhaustion and my despair? Will you take that too, Master?”

"Yes, my padawan,” Qui-Gon’s voice promises. “ And your burning fear.”

“And what will I be left with?” He doesn’t remember what it’s like to not to be afraid and alone and in pain. 

“Love.”

“Love?” Obi-Wan wonders. The word tastes strange and unwieldy in his mouth.

“Love,” Qui-Gon answers. His voice carries the same warmth that Obi-Wan remembers. He can almost see his master now, an ephemeral outline in front of him, lips curled in a gentle smile and eyes full of a new adoration.

He closes his eyes and takes a deeper breath and lets himself feel the presence in the Force surrounding him like an embrace. Everything goes quiet as the ghost of his master holds him, tighter and tighter until the warmth breaks through his skin. He gasps and cries out in relief at the ease that floods through him. His muscles soften and release. He exhales deeply as everything inside him settles into stillness. He can feel his toes press against solid ground and the earth holding him upright.

He doesn’t fall after all. 

Now he can breathe again. He has a shape and a form. He’s no longer dissolving in time and space, circling the past and fighting and calculating the future. 

And the Force presence, Qui-Gon, is still there, only he can feel it (him?) inside now, a spark in his heart and a glow pulsing through his limbs. 

There’s a sense of being _together_ and a love that transcends sentient categories. It is pure, unselfish, untouched by the vicissitudes of human existence. It is just _love_.

“The Force is love, did you know?” Force-Qui-Gon rumbles. His lips seem to brush Obi-Wan’s forehead. “The Light and the Dark—all love. There is no light and dark when they are united, when love can love its own fear then fear becomes love.”

“I don’t understand,” Obi-Wan admits, tipping his face up to meet transparent eyes. He is imagining the outline of his master. There are many things he has forgotten over the years, but Qui-Gon’s face is etched in indelible ink in his mind.

“Neither did I. But I will teach you. If you’ll let me,” Qui-Gon answers.

He wants to say yes. He feels the truth in Qui-Gon’s words, even if he doesn’t understand. 

“But this isn’t real,” he sighs sadly, heart sinking. “A Force vision, or delusion this may be, but I know it will not last.”

“You are afraid this isn’t real,” Qui-Gon corrects him in an exasperatingly familiar tone. “You are afraid to accept I am here because that could mean losing me again.” There is no censure, only compassion.

Tightness has returned to his jaw. His stomach squeezes upwards. Tears sting his eyes and his throat closes. “Yes,” Obi-Wan chokes out, head falling forward to meet a warm solidity that should not be there. 

“That’s alright, Obi-Wan. Can I stay here with you, for a little while?” 

Something very like the knuckles of Qui-Gon’s hand brushes his cheek and he remembers with stark clarity the last time Qui-Gon touched him, tentative and tender in all of the ways his words were not. Who is this Qui-Gon who speaks of love so freely? 

Could anyone blame him for wanting to know?

“For a little while,” he breathes into the space where the lip of Qui-Gon’s tunics should be, and closes his eyes, enveloped in the ghostly embrace. The presence who is both Qui-Gon and the Force hums with grateful joy.

The night darkens, quiets. At some point, the rain stops. And when Obi-Wan opens his eyes, he sees, for the first time, stars on the horizon.


End file.
